Keep an eye on Ed Miliband today. His future is a shaky one

A big day for George Osborne, but there's an argument for putting the spotlight on Ed Miliband. We don't get to hear him in the chamber – Ed Balls will be replying to the Chancellor's statement – but part of today's ritual is studying how Labour and its leader respond to both the statement and the wider crisis. Mr Miliband has been on the screens with his pun du jour, but so far his economic argument is failing to find any takers.

In Cabinet this morning the Labour position was described as "isolated and eccentric" – no surprise there. The view in No10 is that Mr Miliband has painted himself into a corner by arguing for more spending and more borrowing when the world has concluded the opposite is needed. Conservatives look at public and private polling and conclude that voters prefer their argument to Labour's. Separately, they rejoice at the way Mr Miliband has hummed and hawed about tomorrow's strikes. Yesterday he suggested he might be agin' it, but this morning he said he would not condemn it. Waffling is worse than having a clear view for or against.

George Osborne and David Cameron will try to portray him as dangerously wrong on the economy, and as a friend of union militants who are going to make life difficult for the hard-working majority tomorrow. No wonder it is getting easy to find Labour voices who complain Mr Miliband is getting it wrong on all fronts and is not a credible long-term prospect. And why many of them will be watching with interest how Ed Balls does against Mr Osborne this afternoon.